The Polish Air Power’s F-35A Husarz fifth era fighter fleet has surpassed 1,000 flight hours throughout coaching in the US, after they crossed the five hundred flight milestone in December 2025. The service’s first stealth fighter was unveiled throughout a rollout ceremony on the Lockheed Martin Aeronautics facility in Fort Price, Texas, on August 28, 2024, with the primary of the plane anticipated to reach within the nation close to the tip of 2026. Coaching flights are meant not solely to construct pilot qualification, but additionally to extend upkeep proficiency amongst Polish Air Power floor crews. A contract to obtain 32 F-35A fighters was finalised in 2020, marking a serious milestone within the plane’s proliferation into Japanese Europe together with into former Soviet-allied Warsaw Pact states.
The procurement of 32 F-35s is one in every of a variety of investments made by the Polish Defence Ministry to modernise the nation’s forces, with the Ministry in August 2025 having signed a $3.8 billion contract to modernise 48 F-16C/D Block 52+ fighters to the F-16V, which can revolutionise their fight capabilities and convey their avionics to a comparable customary to these of the F-35. The Ministry in 2022 ordered 48 South Korean FA-50 light-weight fighters, which have equally superior avionics, to increase its fleet at a decrease value. The F-35 is predicted to function a power multiplier for these fourth era plane, with its extra highly effective sensors and extra advance information hyperlinks permitting it to very considerably enhance the situational consciousness of the broader fleet, whereas its superior air defence suppression capabilities may enable it to ‘kick down the door’ into effectively protected airspace in Belarus or Russia.
Poland’s most influential navy thinkers, reminiscent of President of Academy24, Normal (ret.) Jaroslaw Gromadzinski and former Chief of the Normal Workers Rajmund Andrzejczak, have broadly advocated a serious shift within the nation’s defence posture aimed particularly at getting ready for battle with Russia, and establishing a a lot expanded functionality to launch massive scale strikes on important strategic targets within the nation. Though the Polish Air Power’s capabilities are being revolutionised, the nation’s floor power transformation has stood out as by far probably the most vital amongst European NATO members. 366 Abrams tanks have been ordered from the US, in addition to 360 South Korean K2 tanks out of a deliberate complete procurement of 1000, representing one of many quickest buildups of armour seen anyplace on the earth.
Outstandingly massive orders South Korean K9 howitzers and Chunmoo rocket artillery methods are additional quickly increasing the Polish Army’s fight potential complementing enhancements to air energy. It’s anticipated that the Polish Army will play an outsized function in any NATO battle effort in opposition to Russia, whereas the comparatively small fighter fleet will rely extra closely on help from different NATO members. Polish contractor personnel have already been enjoying a disproportionately vital function within the Russian-Ukrainian Battle on the frontlines, with models such because the Polish Volunteer Corps made up of personnel from the nation which are formally on go away to permit them to deploy to the energetic battle zone. A presence of hundreds and by some estimated over 10,000 personnel has been sustained on and across the Ukrainian frontlines.
The crossing of a major milestone getting ready for F-35 operations from bases in Poland intently follows an announcement by Polish President Karol Navrocki emphasising that his nation ought to begin creating nuclear weapons, specifying {that a} future nuclear arsenal can be aimed toward Russia. This follows a number of reported requests by Polish officers to enter right into a nuclear sharing settlement with the US, underneath which the Polish Air Power can be given wartime entry to American warheads that may be saved on the nation’s territory. Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Turkey, and the UK, which all have nuclear sharing agreements with the US, have all positioned orders for F-35A fighters to function the first supply platforms for American B61-12 nuclear bombs, elevating a major chance that Polish F-35As are additionally envisaged to finally have a nuclear strike function.
